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How To: Solder Large Gauge Wire.


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Anyone have a tutorial for closed ended terminals?

This is how i have done in past

Us iron or torch to pre tin the wire.. (Cover stripped wire with solder)

Put closed end lug in vise.

Get the ring term how as hell with torch.

Fill with molten solder keep it hot with torch and slowly push wire into terminal

Keep it hot with torch a sec to allow some of the solder to wick its way into the wire

Hold still and allow to cool

But id rather the other type terms. Personally

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Pretty much same as my method, but pretining the wire makes a lil better connextion.. And also keeps strands stuck together for easier insertsion

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  • 2 weeks later...

I was trying to get my wire soldered and the wire wont take the solder. I have tried rosin core like Steve said, I have tried silver bearing, with and without flux, I even cut a piece of wire off and heated it until the rubber melted off and it will melt but wont take up the solder. Whats wrong lol? I thought I bought ofc but turned out to be cca from knuconceptz.

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  • 10 months later...

Flux is some serious stuff... Once I inserted my 1/0 into the closed end filled with molten solder, it was like an instant bond! Bonded so quickly that I couldn't get some of my wires seated all the way down to the end of the terminal. I tried pulling the terminals off as hard as I could pull, and it wasn't going anywhere! They are still good connections and don't seem to be coming loose at all.

I noticed no one mentioned to sand the inside of the terminals for a better bond. I always sand out the inside with my Dremmel tool, then add small amount of flux, heat the terminal and fill it up with molten solder, then as quickly as i can keeping safety in mind, jam the wire into the lug. Solid hold withing 2-3 seconds.

2013 Toyota Camry SE

240a MechMan HO Alternator

1/0 Welding Flex Cable Big 3

CT Sounds 4000.1D

Kenwood XR400-4 Mid/High Amp

SoundQubed Q4-120 Mid Amp

Infinity Kappa 6.5 components

Kappa 6x9's for rear deck fill (coming out)

(4) 8" PRV 8MB450's

Set of SoundQubed SuperTweets

(2) DSS Ethos 12's D2's @32.5hz (building 4th order enclosure)

(2) SQ HDC3 10's @ 33.5hz (current build, loving them)

Pioneer AVH-X4600BT

100 sq/ft Stinger RoadKill Sound Deadner

120 sq/ft QMat Sound Deadener

(4) Juice Box Black Cherries

Lots and Lots of feet of SHCA wire, along with 50' of Welding 1/0

2 Runs of 1/0 Positive front to back

ToolMaker Everywhere

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  • 11 months later...

When I did mine I decided to take a wire brush to the gold plated ring to clean up all the flame marks and the point where you melt solder. Question is did I just make my terminals susceptible to corrosion or rust? I see a small ring of orange around one of my ground connections on my passenger side battery that appears to be rust or corrosion (no picture). I did this for my Big3, or more like a Big 6 for my duramax, but it has only been on for about a week so I'm worried about the longevity of it. I bought techflex and more heat shrink so I have to pull the wires out anyways to dress them up but I'm wondering if I should buy new terminals and redo everything without brushing off the gold plating this time around.

Here is a example of a terminal I did:

IMAG1793_zpseww0ujkv.jpg

Edited by ILuvJDM
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  • 4 weeks later...

Definitely use flux, and if the solder doesn't flow, add more flux. It's not necessary to sand the inside of the terminal so it's bright, you're chemically cleaning it with the flux.

I'm suprised that no one mentioned solder pellets for the big closed lugs? Or tin/solder pots for tinning wires? Tinned wires aren't always the answer though. If you twist em round and tin them for insertion into your amp outputs, you ultimately give up a lot of surface/transfer area versus a flattened cable, tinned or not. If you leave your twisted up cables bare, they flatten and spread out easier.

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